The Spotlight Report on Sustainable Development 2018 includes a chapter on the links between food, health and the environment that calls for new priorities and approaches to make food systems sustainable. The Report was launched on the opening day of the High Level Political Forum at the United Nations in New York/USA by a global coalition of civil society organisations and trade unions.

The close links between food, health and the environment are highlighted by the International Panel of Experts on Sustainable Food Systems (IPES-FOOD) in “Exploring new policy pathways”, the latest Spotlight Report by the Civil Society Reflection Group on the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.

The side event "SDG Implementation at National Level: What’s the Point of National Reports?" focused on voluntary national reports (VNRs) and parallel “shadow” or “spotlight” reports generated by civil society organizations (CSOs) on progress towards attaining the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

Moderator Roberto Bissio, Social Watch, asked presenters to address whether the shadow reports lead to changes and what can be learned from each other’s experiences.

After many years of women’s, union and human rights movements campaigning against bilateral and regional agreements known as “free trade agreements” or “trade and investment agreements”, the government of the United States of America has taken the opposite direction. President Donald Trump has imposed protective tariffs on steel and aluminum, prompting retaliatory action and sparking a “trade war” with u predictable consequences. Trump intends to renegotiate the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) and to withdraw from the Pacific Agreement, formerly known as the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), now renamed as the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP) by the eleven countries that did sign it. However, these two additional adjectives in the name do not reflect a change in the essence of the agreement pushed by Barack Obama to oppose China’s advance in the region.

Despite the Czech Republic stagnating in the worldwide effort to bring about gender equality, the country’s government plans to cut funding for equality projects significantly in the coming years. That’s according to the Czech branch of the international NGO network, Social Watch.

For the first time the State government this year presented a Gender Budget Statement as part of the annual budget documents, quantifying the allocations that will benefit women during this fiscal.

The statement appears as the last chapter in the appendices to the Budget documents published by the Finance Department and tabled in the Assembly on March 15. The Budget speech by Finance Minister O. Panneerselvam did not mention it.

CIVICUS speaks with Barbara Adams, senior policy analyst at the Global Policy Forum (GPF), on the problem of private finance within the UN development system, and the need for civil society action in response to these growing trends.